


No Strings Attached

by Sinna



Category: The Flash (Comics), The Flash (TV 2014), The Flash - All Media Types, Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Asexual Character, Fix-It, Multi, Trans Male Character, discussion of child abuse, graphic depiction of a panic attack, technically canon compliant, the coldwave can be read as queerplatonic or romantic but it's definitely there, the members of various teams are mostly just cameos hence me not tagging every single character, what am I fixing? Everything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-27
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-05 11:03:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11012133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sinna/pseuds/Sinna
Summary: In which the Oculus explosion sends Leonard Snart a thousand years into the future and he accidentally adopts his arch-nemesis’ grandson on his way back.





	1. The Explosion

**Author's Note:**

> I incorporated a ton of comics canon into this fic (particularly the first few issues of Impulse (Bart Allen's solo comic) and the 90s run of Young Justice, which had very little in common with the recent cartoon). I've done my best to make it possible to follow without having read those comics, but let me know if there's anything still confusing. I'll include notes on anything I think might be particularly complicated at the end.

Leonard Snart had been expecting a lot of things when he made the (unfortunately heroic) decision to sacrifice himself to save the world. (The universe? The timeline? Something like that.)

What he had not expected was opening his eyes to find himself in the middle of what seemed to be an abandoned lab, surrounded by some incredibly fancy-looking tech. Ray would have had a field day. Unfortunately, he only had a moment to contemplate his surroundings before the world turned inside out and he crumpled to the ground as an unfortunately familiar sensation washed over him.

“Fucking. Time. Travel.” He groaned between gritted teeth, waiting for the pain to fade.

Wherever – Whenever he was, it had to be way further in the future than Hunter had ever taken them. He’d never had side effects this bad before.

Several minutes, or possibly hours, later, the pain finally receded to the point where he could stand again. Taking a closer look at his surroundings, he decided that his original perception might have been a bit off. He couldn’t completely rule out the possibility of abandoned, but the low lighting coming from the hall hinted that this lab was merely shut down for the night. Which meant there was probably a security guard somewhere. Or – since this was most likely the future – maybe just a really good security system. Well, he hadn’t triggered anything yet, so it couldn’t be that good.

He glanced around, then finally approached one of the dark screens. Figuring out when and where he was would be a good start here. Not seeing a mouse or anything, he swiped a finger across the screen experimentally. After a moment, the machine hummed to life.

_User Recognized: Snart, Leonard_

_Access Granted_

Well that was… convenient.

The words flashed across the screen, then faded, to be replaced by a screensaver with a somewhat unfortunately familiar logo.

“STAR Labs.”

He glanced around the screen.

“Date and time,” he muttered. “Where would I find the date and time?”

_2:17 am_

_4/17/2980_

The answers to his question appeared neatly on the screen.

“Great. This thing has voice recognition.”

It took a moment before the full impact of the date sunk in. Well, there went any chance of rescue by the Waverider. Hunter would never agree to take the team this far out, even if he could get a message to them.

On to Plan B.

Leonard would hardly consider himself an expert computer hacker. However, he’d picked up a few things along the way. Gideon had been especially good practice – and with a surprisingly good attitude about it. He needed to learn as much as possible about this future STAR Labs.

Within five minutes, he found a few files that hadn’t been properly secured. He opened the most recent one and scanned the contents.

Some sort of progress report on an experiment they were conducting. A lot about a “Project A”, which seemed to have some relation to the “Speed Force”, lots of details about “cellular degeneration,” which would apparently lead to the loss of their only subject within two years. The report closed with a request to start another experiment before the subject degenerated even further. All of which was very interesting, but not terribly useful.

The rest of the files were similar. Plenty on what they were doing, not much about the actual lab.

Time for Plan C.

“Hey, computer. How do I get out of here?”  

He was already formulating a Plan D, but to his surprise, the computer helpfully pulled up a map of the building, marking an exit route in blue. Leonard checked it quickly, but it did seem a quick and effective exit, assuming this map was an accurate representation of reality and security was really as minimal as it seemed so far.

Only one way to find out.

He stepped out of the room. No alarm bells so far. Although maybe he’d already set them off and he just didn’t know. Oh well. Too late to turn back now.

He pulled up a mental picture of the map the computer had shown him. He just had to follow this corridor to the end, then take a left and-

Sometimes, in the middle of a job, Leonard Snart would get a feeling. Nothing he could explain, but he always knew.

_The Flash._

So that’s why Future STAR Labs security sucked. They had Barry Allen’s great-whatever-grandkid as a personal high-speed security force.

Leonard instinctively reached for his gun, cursing under his breath when his fingers brushed the empty holster instead.

After a minute or so, it was clear that, whatever his _feeling_ , there was no speedster on their way to take him down. That, of course, raised the question of what _was_ there. He looked around.

The nearest door was slightly propped ajar. Leonard took a few steps closer and peered through the sliver of open space…

…and almost jumped back as the source of his _feeling_ finally became clear. He forced himself to remain rooted to the spot. If future-Flash hadn’t already come for him, it likely wasn’t going to change in the next 10 seconds.

After a moment, he understood why. Between him and the familiar blur was a thick pane of something resembling glass. The speedster was running on a treadmill. Some sort of training, maybe? Something shifted in the air and the speedster was sent flying.

“Shit!”

For the first time, Leonard realized that the speedster wasn’t the only one in the room. Two scientists had been sitting just outside his thin sliver of view. Now, they were on their feet, rushing towards the fallen speedster. Now that the speedster wasn’t a blur of movement, two things were very obvious.

One: The speedster had some sort of helmet covering much of his head.

Two: He was just a kid.

“What happened?!” the older scientist yelled.

“He’s degenerating faster than expected,” the younger one replied, looking at some sort of instrument. “Get the IV. We need to up his protein intake if we’re gonna keep him long enough for the current experiments to have significant results.”

So the experiments he’d been reading about… they were doing that to a kid??

“Any damage to the VR helmet?”

“Nothing as far as I can tell.”

“Good. He’s hard enough to contain with that thing.”

Leonard backed away from the door, conjuring up the exit route in his head. If he had to listen to any more of that crap, he wasn’t going to be able to stop himself from rescuing the kid here and now. Which wouldn’t really do either of them any good, seeing as he had no clue what the 30th century was like and no way to contain an out of control speedster.

He silently promised himself he’d be back. Or at least let Allen know about it once he got back to 2016. The heroes could handle it.

Five more minutes, and he was out the door, still without any signs of security.

Three more steps and a hopped fence and he was safely away from STAR Labs. He took a moment to gather his wits and take in his surroundings.

To his surprise, the 30th century didn’t seem nearly as wildly futuristic as he would have expected. Sure, there wasn’t an inch of plant life anywhere in sight, but it seemed things hadn’t changed nearly as much as he would have expected in a thousand years.

“Please state your name and present your ID card, citizen.”

Or maybe not. Apparently, Ray’s Atom suit robots had gotten some major upgrades. Or something. The robot cop confronting him looked almost human.

“Look, I’m just out for a midnight stroll here and-”

“Please state your name and present your government issue ID card.”

“I think I saw a heist going on about two streets back. Maybe you should check on that first.”

“Facial scan complete. Match found. Contacting Flash Museum. Please remain calm.”

Leonard hesitated. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he didn’t like it. Especially not if this time period’s Flash was about to get involved. However, he wasn’t stupid enough to try to take on an overpowered robot from the future with a gun pointed at him. At least, not without a plan and ideally backup.

The minutes dragged along in silence as he went through and discarded plans A through K. Finally, a door in a nearby wall opened up and a frazzled-looking woman rushed out.

“Sorry for the trouble officer! We didn’t even realize he had gotten …out.” She stared at him for several moments. “Thank you, I’ll take it from here.”

The robot offered a rough salute and jolted away. The woman grabbed Leonard’s arm and dragged him into the building, shutting the sturdy metal doors behind her.

“You’re not a bot,” she accused him the second they were inside.

“Thanks for noticing,” he drawled. “Now who are you and where am I?’”

“Dr. Irene Nguyen. Senior Historical Consultant for the Flash Museum. Who are you? A copycat? Some sort of obsessed fan? I have to say you’re the most accurate cosplayer I’ve ever seen.”

“What makes you think I’m copying anyone?”

“No one just accidentally dresses up like thousand year old superhero. Especially not well enough to fool the bots’ facial recognition software.”

Oh fuck. It was all starting to come together.

“Better question,” he said. “Why do you have robots that look like thousand year old superheroes?”

 “We’re a museum! Interactive exhibits are vital to education. The kids love being able to talk to their favorite heroes!”

“Last I checked, Captain Cold was a supervillain.”

(Heroic sacrifice notwithstanding, but that had happened outside of time itself, so it didn’t count. He wasn’t planning on doing anything like that again.)

Dr. Nguyen bristled. “Don’t even start that with me, young man! I wrote my graduate thesis on Heroism in Central City in the 21st Century. I had an entire chapter on Cold. I will quote sources at you if I have to!”

Leonard couldn’t help it. He laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“Wouldn’t you think it was hilarious if you found out people were writing graduate theses about your life in the future?”

He could see the wheels in her head spinning. 3… 2… 1…

“You can’t be-“ She hesitated. “I’m not dumb enough to fall for- Leonard Snart has been dead for almost a thousand years.”

“What, did they never mention the time travel?”

She steeled her posture.

“Who are you and what do you want?”

He folded his arms and looked down at her.

“Leonard Snart, and I just want to get back to 2016.” He paused. “And get that speedster kid I saw away from STAR Labs and to someone who might actually care about curing him. Which ironically will probably mean taking him back to STAR Labs. In 2016. Assuming I can even get back to 2016. And can figure out a way to slow the kid down without my cold gun until I can get him to Flash.”

“Bart Allen,” she supplied.

He looked at her blankly. “What? No, he goes by Barry. Are the history books really that off?”

She shook her head. “No, the kid you mentioned. His name is Bart Allen. And… I still don’t believe you, but if you’re going to get him out of there, I’ll help you.”

Leonard raised an eyebrow. “That’s a quick turnaround.”

“I knew his father. Don and his sister Dawn helped a lot with the renovations back in ‘83, and they visited whenever they could. If you’re going to help get Bart away from that lab, it doesn’t matter who you are. I’ll help.”

“All right then. Deal. Do you think you could get me the components to rebuild the cold gun? Or something similar?”

Dr. Nguyen smiled.

“I can do you one better than that. Follow me.”

She led him up a seemingly neverending flight of stairs, all while prattling on about a broken elevator and explaining more about the museum. Apparently, the museum had opened as a way to raise revenue and capitalize on the particle accelerator explosion in 2017 and STAR Labs had switched its focus to Central City’s superheroes in 2045, all while continuing to provide backup to the Flash and his successors and eventually working as a metahuman investigation lab. Which had somehow turned into treating Flash’s distant descendant as a lab rat.

Leonard was starting to think this was some sort of trap, when they finally made it to whatever exhibit Dr. Nguyen was trying to show him.

There was a cursory effort to make the room look like some sort of warehouse. Pedestals around the room held what he would have assumed were statues if he hadn’t already been mistaken for an extremely lifelike robot. Thankfully, the lights were dim and everything shut down. He tried not to look too closely at the people recreated here. It was bad enough knowing one of these was him. He didn’t want to know who else might be famous enough to live on nearly a thousand years later.

Dr. Nguyen made her way swiftly across the room. Leonard tried to pretend he didn’t recognize the man on the pedestal she was approaching. But it really was too much to resist.

It was an excellent fake, he had to give it that. Might have even fooled his own mother, if she hadn’t died when he was only six. He was a little grateful that they’d modeled it on his current costume. He didn’t want to know his own future, even if it was only what his future self thought was fashionable.

Although the thought that maybe this was the only version of him that they had couldn’t help crawling its way to the forefront of his brain. What if he never made it back?

Dr. Nguyen ignored the statue and made her way to the glass case next to it. Leonard recognized the metallic shape glinting below the glass surface.

“That’s my gun,” he realized.

“Captain Cold’s ice pistol,” Dr. Nguyen confirmed.

“It’s just called a cold gun,” Leonard snapped, sizing up the display case. “How thick is the glass?”

Dr. Nguyen shook her ring of keys at him. “No supervillain skills necessary. I do work here, remember?”

Leonard offered a slight bow. “Be my guest.”

Within moments, he held the cold gun in his hands once again, as Dr. Nguyen relocked the display case. Carefully, he ran his fingers along every inch of it. It wasn’t quite what he remembered. Maybe he would get back to 2016.

Or maybe someone else had made their own adjustments. He needed to stop thinking like that.

“Next stop, the Allen kid.”

Dr. Nguyen was much quieter as she led the way back to the lab. Leonard followed her example. He wished there was some way to test the gun, but she’d promised it was kept in pristine working condition, and it wasn’t like it would be easy to test it without drawing attention. He’d just have to trust her.

 

This was definitely not the best plan he’d ever come up with, but he’d always been good at improvising.

Dr. Nguyen rapped gently on the still slightly ajar door, while Leonard pressed himself against the wall, just outside the doorframe.

“What is it?” one of the scientists shouted.

“It’s Irene,” she called back softly. “I thought you might need some coffee.”

“You’re a blessing,” the second scientist declared. “I could really use something to keep my hands warm in here.”

He sounded closer. That was a cue if he’d ever heard one. He signaled for Dr. Nguyen to stand back as he kicked open the door.

“Sorry kids, but I’m afraid this coffee’s iced.”

Luckily, all the main controls were the same, and he managed to ice the scientists’ feet to the ground within a few seconds.

“Hope you don’t need those,” he remarked as he breezed by, picking the keyring from the older one’s pockets. “Which one of these lets the tyke out?”

“You don’t want to do that,” the younger scientist protested. Leonard pointed the gun at him.

“Which key?” he asked, his voice dropping to a more guttural growl.

“The blue one,” the older one supplied.

“Thank you, Dr-” Leonard leaned in to read the man’s name tag. “Dr. Thawne.”

The speedster seemed oblivious as Leonard opened the door. He approached the child and aimed the gun.

“Hope this works,” he muttered under his breath.

He pulled the trigger.

The blur of a speedster slowly morphed into a more recognizable shape as Bart Allen slowed to a near-halt. Almost immediately, he began speeding up again. Still, Leonard could follow his movements as the boy reached up to pull the VR helmet off his head.

“Everything went all fast all of a- Hi.”

The boy blinked owlishly at Leonard.

“Why are you pointing _a gun atme_?”

As Bart’s speech and movements began to speed up, Leonard hit him with another cold blast.

“That’s why,” he explained.

“You fixed me!” Bart shrieked in delight. Suddenly, the small speedster disappeared, only to reappear less than a minute later. As Leonard’s cold blast hit him, he could see the panic drop from the boy’s eyes.  

“It’s only a temporary solution,” Leonard explained. “Since no one else in this lab seems to give a shit about you, I’m taking it upon myself to find someone to fix you.”

“Hear that, kids,” he turned to the two still-half frozen scientists. “You’re so bad at helping people that a supervillain from the past had to step in and stop you.”

He led Bart out of the lab, dousing the boy with ice every few seconds or so to ease the out of control speedster.

Dr. Nguyen was waiting.

“Auntie Irene!” Bart shouted, hugging her.

Luckily, the boy was smart enough to back away from her before he lost control of his own speed. He was surprisingly calm about the constant blasts of cold. Leonard didn’t like what that implied. He considered going back in and icing those scientists more fully, but he needed every scrap of energy to keep the kid under control.

“You got someplace we can go?” he asked Irene, suddenly very aware of the fact that his plan stopped with rescuing Bart.

“I can send you to someone who can help,” Dr. Nguyen said.

It would have to be good enough, he supposed. She knelt in front of Bart, seeming to ignore his shaking limbs and Leonard’s gun.

“Bart, do you think you can take Mr. Snart home?” Dr. Nguyen asked.

Bart paused for just a moment.

“I can go home?” he asked in a soft voice.

“You can,” she confirmed. “But you have to take Mr. Snart with you.”

Leonard wondered when he’d become “Mr. Snart” to her.

“I can do it,” Bart promised. “Well, I think I can?”

“You mess up, I’ll hit you with the cold gun,” Leonard offered, trying and failing to make it not sound like a threat.

Bart grinned.

Before he could brace himself, Bart had him by the hand and the world blurred around him. A few dizzying moments later, and Bart’s grip suddenly tightened. Leonard guessed that meant he’d forgotten how to stop, and fired the cold gun.

The transition back to normal speed was dizzying and undignified. Leonard stumbled to the ground in front of a strangely familiar figure.

“Iris West?” he gasped..

“Get that gun away from my grandson,” she demanded.

“That would be a bad idea,” Leonard replied evenly. “Until I can figure out a way to keep up a constant stream at exactly the right temperature, without frying the circuitry, shooting the kid every few seconds is the best I can do to keep him from speeding out of control.”

Iris raised an eyebrow. Leonard noticed for the first time that she wasn’t nearly as young as the last time he’d seen her. He’d guess she was in her mid-forties now, at the youngest. Still didn’t explain why she was in 2980, or why this kid, who had to be at least twelve, was her grandson, but he’d figure that out later.

“He’s really helping me, Grandma!” Bart promised.

“Did Barry send you?” Iris asked.

“No.”

“What year?”

“I’m from 2016,” Leonard told her. “Blew myself up to save the universe and ended up here.”

“Barry said you went good,” she remarked, almost to herself.              

He dosed the kid with ice. If he held the trigger a tiny bit longer than he should have, he could hardly be blamed for it, right?

“Want to explain what you’re doing here?” he asked. “Somehow I get the feeling the answer isn’t a really good skincare routine.”

“I was born here,” Iris explained. “My parents – the ones here – sent me back in time to protect me, then pulled me back when they thought it was safe to do so. They put me in Barry’s timeline because they knew I’d be safe. I guess they didn’t plan on me marrying him.”

She twisted her wedding ring, the only part of her that looked old enough to be from 2016.

“Look, weepy backstory aside, can you get me and the kid back to 2016? Barry might be the only one who can fix him.”

She nodded. “Follow me.”

 

The lab in Iris West-Allen’s basement wasn’t nearly as fancy as the one they’d come from, but Leonard immediately preferred it. He counted at least four minor safety infractions, but at least no one was performing experiments on kids.

Iris gestured to one of the larger machines.

“It’s what they used to send me back originally,” she explained. “I’ve been having some trouble adjusting things, and whatever they originally used to power it is long gone. I’ve been trying to fix it, but I’m not exactly good with this sort of thing.”

“Why don’t you ask your parents?” Leonard asked. “Seems like they would know how to fix it up.”

“They’re dead.”

Leonard nodded. “I see.”

“Does this mean I have to go back to the lab?” Bart asked, lower lip quivering pitifully.

“You’ll never have to go back there again,” Iris promised. “It just might be a little while before we can fix you.”

Bart frowned.

“So more cold?”

Leonard nodded. “Sorry, kiddo.” He turned to Iris. “Can you take over while I look at the machine?”

Iris nodded and held out her hands. It felt wrong to be giving over the cold gun to his nemesis’ future wife, but, well, were he and Flash really even nemeses anymore? They’d fought a giant shark together. That had to count for something.

 

Between his basic engineering knowledge and the knowledge he’d gained watching Jax fix up the Waverider, Leonard had the machine in what he thought might be working condition within a few hours.

That didn’t solve the problem of the power source. There was really only one option, and it was a terrible idea.

“We’re going to have to use the gun,” he admitted finally.

“We are using the gun,” Iris pointed out.

Bart had fallen asleep a couple hours ago, but Iris kept the cold gun trained on him in case his dreams turned into high speed reality.

“No, as the power source,” Leonard explained.

“What about Bart?”

“Hopefully, he’ll stay asleep. Unless you want to wait around and see how long it takes those scientists I iced in STAR Labs to figure out where he’s gone?”

Iris handed over the gun. Within a few minutes, Leonard had disassembled it and hooked the power source into the machine. The two adults traded glances as the machine powered to life.

“You pick him up,” Leonard murmured. “You’re probably better at that sort of thing.”

“Don’t try that with me, Leonard Snart,” Iris retorted. “I know about your sister, remember?”

But she picked up the kid all the same.

“It’s still set for the date they brought me back,” she warned.

“Doesn’t matter,” he told her. “We get close enough to 2016 and I can send a signal to the Waverider.”

The machine was finally fully powered, creating a shimmering breach in the fabric of spacetime.

“Ready?” Iris asked.

“I’m always ready,” he assured her.

The two of them stepped through the breach.

 

Being spit out in STAR Labs by non-Waverider time travel was becoming a theme in Leonard Snart’s life and he was not fond of it. Nor was he fond of the side effects.

“Captain Cold?” a panicked voice said.

“Don’t shoot,” Leonard snapped, still staring at the spinning floor. “You’ll probably hit Iris or the kid.”

“What kid?”

Leonard regained his composure and looked around. Sure enough, Bart Allen was gone. Iris West-Allen, empty-handed, was rubbing her head.

“Bart!” she shouted as the words registered.

Leonard looked around.

Ramon, Joe West, Snow with a terrible dye job, and a kid in a yellow suit with a lighting bolt. A kid who was very much not Barry Allen.

“You a speedster?” he asked the kid.

“Uh, yeah.”

“There’s a kid with out of control speed powers running around… somewhere on this planet. Probably. If you could catch him that would be… much appreciated.”

The speedster zipped off.

“Someone want to explain what’s going on?” Joe asked.

Iris scrambled to her feet.

“Dad!”

The resulting hug was sickeningly sweet.

Leonard turned his attention to Ramon.

“What year is it?”

“June 3rd, 2017,” Cisco rattled off, seeming surprisingly chill with the implications of time travel.

“Do you have my sister’s latest number?”

The way Cisco’s face froze up was a definite yes.

“Hand over your phone. She probably thinks I’ve been dead for a year.”

“Wait, so you’re from-” Snow paused delicately.

“I’m not dead,” Leonard finished bluntly. “I got stuck in the very distant future after the Oculus exploded, but I’m very much alive and I plan to keep it that way,”

Ramon wordlessly handed over the phone. Leonard found Lisa’s name easily enough – he did not approve of the heart emoji next to it – and called.

“Hey, baby,” Lisa purred.

“You know you could do better,” he said.

The resulting shriek was almost painful. “Cisco, if this is some sort of sick joke I will actually murder you.”

“Not a joke,” Leonard assured her. “Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

Lisa laughed.

“Where are you? I’m coming right now I don’t care if you’re halfway across the globe.”

“STAR Labs.”

“Perfect. I’ll see you in five minutes.”

“Drive safe.”

“You know I won’t.”

Leonard handed the phone back to Cisco, who was turning an interesting shade of green.

“I’m not going to threaten you,” Leonard told him. “Lisa is my baby sister but she’s more than capable of taking care of herself. Just know that I’ll have no qualms about helping her hide the body.”

Cisco gulped. “Got it.”

“What happened?” Joe West was asking his daughter. “Iris, you’re almost as old as me. We’ve been trying to get you back, but…”

Iris shrugged. “The technology to get me from here to there won’t be invented for five hundred years. I ended up in the future. I had a life there. Oh! You’re a great grandfather now!”

She delivered the news awkwardly. Leonard could see her struggling to readjust to the world she’d left behind so many years ago.

“Were you happy?” Joe asked.

“There were good times,” she told him. “Barry was there. Another speedster took his place. I still got my time with him. I just didn’t get to live it here.” She hugged him again. “I missed you, Dad.”

“I missed you too,” Joe said. “Are you here to stay?”

She nodded. “There’s nothing there for me anymore.”

“Now what’s this about me being a great-grandfather?”

As if on cue, the younger speedster and Bart appeared back in the lab. Leonard was relieved to see that Bart stopped on his own, with no signs of struggling against his own power. He was less pleased to see that the kid looked about two years older. The report’s mentions of rapid aging were starting to make sense.

“I think we cured him,” Flash Jr declared. He was obviously trying to look less out of breath than he felt.

“How old is the kid really?” Leonard asked Iris.

“He was born just over two years ago, from my perspective,” she admitted.

That explained a lot, actually.

“So we’re dealing with a two year old in a teenager’s body?” Snow asked. “Sounds like every mom’s worst nightmare.”

Iris frowned. “He’s been living in a virtual reality sped up to match his brain speed for most of that time. He probably has the intelligence of your average twelve year old.”

“Except he has no concept of danger!” Flash Jr pointed out.

“I’m still here, you know,” Bart pointed out, crossing his arms.

Joe was getting misty-eyed.

“This is my great-grandson?”

“Wait- Iris, he’s your kid?” Flash Jr asked.

“My grandson,” Iris corrected.

“I’m meeting my grandnephew before my nephew? …or niece?”

“You have both,” Iris told him with a sad smile. “Twins.”

Leonard smirked as he placed the kid in the costume.

“Wally West. I should have known.”

“Oops.”

“He knew about Barry too,” Cisco pointed out. “It’s probably fine.”

“Cisco!” Snow scolded.

“Your hair looked better natural,” Leonard told her.

“This is natural,” Snow told him. “Came with the power to shoot ice from my hands.”

Leonard raised an eyebrow, already considering the possibility of an ice themed heist. Him, Snow, Mardon…

“Whatever you’re thinking, stop,” Snow ordered.

He filed it away to consider later.

The familiar clack of high heeled boots echoed in the hall, and before any of the non-speedsters among them could do more than turn to look, Lisa had launched herself across the room.

“Lenny!” she hugged him tightly, and for once he didn’t pull away. “They told me you were dead.”

“I found myself in the middle of a time explosion,” he explained. “Apparently the mortality rate is lower than expected.”

“Have you told Mick yet?” she asked.

“I’ve barely had time to tell you, much less call up the whole gang.”

Lisa raised an eyebrow. He really should have known better than to try to lie to her.

“I don’t know how to contact him,” he admitted.

“Cisco, baby, you can contact the Legends, right?” Lisa asked.

The little coo in her voice when she talked to him was already starting to annoy Leonard.

“I can try,” Cisco agreed. “It’s not exactly a hard science though.”

Finally, Lisa looked around.

“Okay, I know everyone here except the tyke,” she said. “What’s your story, kiddo?”

Bart grinned at someone finally asking him directly.

“I was fighting monsters on the planet Zorg when Mr. Snart rescued me from the lab and iced me so I wouldn’t lose control of my powers and then Aunt Irene sent us to Grandma and then Grandma and Mr. Snart fixed the time machine and then we came here and then Wally West raced me to help me control my speed and then it’s now. My name’s Bart Allen.”

Lisa grinned.

“I like him. Short and to the point.”

“Not that short,” Bart grumbled.

To be fair, he was at least three inches taller than he’d been when Leonard had met him a few hours ago.

“Okay, well, as charming as this little reunion party is, I’m heading out and taking my sister to dinner. No nerdy boyfriends allowed.”

Leonard pretended not to notice when she blew a kiss over her shoulder to Cisco.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, you're probably wondering what's up with Iris, even if you did read the comics. There was a lot of different versions to choose from and really no way to explain without infodumping. So here's a rough timeline:  
> 2017 - A month or so after Barry is taken by the speed force, Iris is taken back to the future by her biological parents. She's already pregnant but doesn't know it.  
> 2960 - Iris arrives in the future. No one will send her back. She throws a fit, but to no avail.  
> 2961 - Don and Dawn Allen are born  
> 2965 - Barry Allen escapes the Speed Force via *handwave* He and Iris live together for a while and raise their kids.  
> 2977 - The Speed Force decides that whatever handwavey thing Barry used to get away is not enough anymore. Barry sacrifices himself again.  
> 2978 - The Thawnes start taking over the government. Don and and Meloni Thawne fall in love. Bart Allen is born. Don and Dawn are killed in a rebellion. STAR Labs takes in Bart. (So yes, that one scientist is a relative of Bart's, although not a close one.)  
> 2979 - Iris finds the time machine and starts fixing it up.


	2. The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bart Allen adjusts to life in the past, and blissfully ignores any arch-rivalries that might get in his way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I updated the tags, as there are two major potential triggers in this chapter.

He’d been home – well, at Lisa’s apartment – for about three days when he heard a stampede coming up the stairs. He was about to vault the couch and hide out on the fire escape when he recognized a voice.

“I promise he’s not like the Legion of Doom guy,” Sara Lance said. “A lot of things changed in two years.”

“He still killed Amaya!” an unfamiliar voice insisted.

“I’m fine now, aren’t I?” another voice – presumably Amaya – retorted. “Stop worrying, Nate. If Sara and Mick trust him then I do too.”

Leonard strode towards the door and threw it open. Whatever snappy one-liner he’d planned to say dropped out of his mind when he saw Mick standing there, staring at him in shock.

“Long time, no see,” he managed weakly.

“No more heroic sacrifices,” Mick demanded.

“We’re agreed on that,” Leonard told him. “So, introduce me to the new teammates.”

Sara pointed to the two new Legends. “Nate, our resident historian who can turn his skin into steel. And the cute girl is Amaya. She’s from the 40s and she has an amulet that lets her channel wild animals.”

“And talk to dinosaurs,” Ray added.

Leonard raised an eyebrow.

“What happened to not travelling more than a hundred years into the past or future?”

“Rip may have been exaggerating the dire effects of long distance time travel,” Stein admitted.

Leonard sighed. “Of course he did. Well, did none of you think to look for me in another time period? I left you a note in 2980.”

“You did?” Sara looked guilty.

“Well, no, but I stole the cold gun from the Flash museum and kidnapped Flash’s grandson while giving STAR Labs scientists third degree frostbite so I might as well have.”

“That math isn’t adding up,” Jax noticed. “Unless speedsters live way longer than the rest of us, Flash shouldn’t have grandchildren alive a thousand years from now.”

“Time travel,” Leonard explained. “I’m sure you’re all familiar with the concept.”

 

He invited them all in for drinks and listened as they recounted the events of their past year. He got the feeling they were editing things out, especially considering the way Mick sat in the nearest chair and clenched his hand as if constantly assuring himself that Leonard was real. Thankfully, no one commented on it.

Apparently, Sara was captain now, and she offered to take him back aboard the ship, but Leonard was surprised to find himself hesitating.

“Mick?”

His partner turned to look at him in surprise.

“It’s up to you, boss.”

“Right. We’re staying.”

Whatever this team was, it wasn’t the Legends he’d left behind just a few days ago from his perspective.

“You can’t just decide for him,” Amaya insisted. “I thought you were supposed to be better than-”

She froze, halfway out of her chair. Nate stepped protectively in front of her.

Leonard raised his eyebrow.

“Okay. Spill. Better than who?”

“The Legion of Doom grabbed you from right after the Remley job,” Mick explained.

Leonard winced.

Sara leaned forward.

“What does that mean? Mick?”

“It’s not like I knew until we were taking him back,” Mick explained defensively.

“The Remley job was one of my dad’s jobs,” Leonard explained slowly. “Things were said, stuff went down, Lisa got hurt, and Mick had to testify against me in court. Knowing me, if I ran into him after that, I was awful to him and anyone he might have called a friend.”

“You could have told me,” Sara told Mick softly.

“Didn’t think you’d care. Not like anyone ever listened to anything I said anyway.”

Leonard frowned. He’d have to find out more about that.

“That explains a lot, actually,” Amaya admitted. “Still doesn’t mean you should make decisions for him though.”

“He wasn’t,” Mick spoke up. “He just knows me better than any of you do, and he knows I’ll follow wherever he leads.”

“Besides, aren’t married couples supposed to stick together?” Leonard added, and the looks on everyone’s faces were priceless.

He decided against mentioning that the marriage was precisely thanks to that same mess of a job that the legion had apparently taken advantage of. Spouses couldn’t testify against each other.

Stein looked like he was trying very hard not to say something offensive – an improvement from his normal habit of blissful ignorance. It probably helped that Jax was glaring at him as if daring him to judge. Amaya looked confused at the very possibility, but she had the excuse of being from the forties. Ray didn’t. Of all of them, Nate seemed the least surprised.

A frown flitted across Sara’s face. He knew she was remembering that kiss, and he wished he could explain it to her better. He liked her, he really did, but he’d never wanted anything lasting or complicated between them. That kiss had been an apology as much as anything else. Maybe someday he would talk to her about it. But not in front of everyone.

Mick grinned. “I’ve missed you.”

“I haven’t had time to miss you,” Leonard lied.

Mick’s grin just widened. He’d never fallen for Leonard’s emotionless tough guy act.

 

Later, when the rest of the Legends were gone, Leonard and Mick curled up together on Lisa’s couch, drinking shitty beer as Mick filled in the gaps the rest of them hadn’t wanted to tell Leonard: how alone he’d felt, the hallucinations, trying to turn Ray into a replacement. He didn’t explicitly say they’d been treating him like shit, but Leonard could read between the lines. It sounded like Amaya was the only one who’d bothered to look past Mick’s - admittedly prickly - exterior.

“So what’s your real story?” Mick asked. “You might be able to satisfy the rest of them with a vague mention of time travel and kidnapped speedsters, but not me.”

Leonard shrugged. “He was a kid, and he couldn’t control his powers. I fixed up a time machine and brought us both back. With the help of Flash’s future wife.”

“More detail than that,” Mick demanded.

Leonard sighed and launched into a full description.

 

When a short kid with big hair and bigger attitude sped into the apartment the next morning, Leonard wished he didn’t recognize him. It was 8:30 am. He should not be woken up by falling books because the youngest speedster still couldn’t quite control his powers.

“How did you even find me?” he asked.

“I just ran around the city until I ended up here,” Bart explained. As if that was a thing normal people just did.

“Could you use the doorbell next time?” Mick requested, trying to huddle back into the blanket cocoon he’d created last night. It was a difficult task considering that Leonard had effectively stolen half the blankets over the course of the night.

“Oh! Sorry!”

Bart zipped back outside. A few seconds later, the doorbell rang.

Leonard sighed and opened it.

“Hello, Bart. So, why are you here?”

“I’m not allowed to wake Uncle Wally or Grandma or Great-Grandpa up before nine,” Bart explained. “I got bored.”

“Hey, Mick,” Leonard called. “Wanna make breakfast for a speedster?”

 

While Mick cooked, Leonard amused the kid. Mostly, they played cards. He caught Bart cheating once, and the speedster didn’t try it again.

Lisa woke up just in time for breakfast.

“Oh hey Bart,” she said.

Bart grinned and ran over to hug her.

“Bacon’s done!” Mick called.

It felt weird for them all to be sitting around the kitchen table, especially with Bart’s speedster costume, but Leonard didn’t really mind. And Mick’s pancakes really were the best in the galaxy.

Lisa’s phone rang just as she was reaching for another helping of bacon. She dropped the bacon on her plate and answered it.

“Hey, honey.”

Leonard frowned. She ignored him.

“Who? Bart?” she nodded along with whatever Cisco was saying. “Yeah, he’s here. Where else would he be?”

Leonard met Mick’s eyes and made a gagging gesture. Lisa flipped him off. Bart giggled.

“Alabama? Why was he in Alabama?... okay fine, don’t tell me.” She paused for a few seconds. “Wait, you’re actually not going to tell me? You are aware that he’s sitting at my kitchen table right now? Fine. But I’m not bringing him over until after breakfast.”

“Might get that breakup you hoped for,” Mick whispered.

“I doubt it,” Leonard whispered back. “They’ve been together for six months apparently. If he hasn’t lost her yet, something like this won’t do it.”

“Yeah, but she didn’t have you around,” Mick reminded him. He hated what that implied and he hated that Mick was right.

“Fine. I’ll let you make it up to me. Dinner tonight. Your treat.” Lisa sighed and hung up the phone. “I don’t know why he bothers keeping secrets from me, honestly.”

She turned to Bart. “Why were you in Alabama?”

“They sent me to go live with Uncle Max,” Bart explained between mouthfuls of food.

“Uncle Max?” Lisa pressed.

“He’s not really my uncle,” Bart said. “But he knows the speed force really well and he’s supposed to be teaching me but mostly he just makes me go to school and yells at me for being too fast.”

Leonard and Lisa looked at each other and frowned.

“Does he scare you?” Leonard asked quietly.

“Nope!” Bart replied cheerfully. “It’s just sooooo booooooring.”

The sigh of relief shared by the three adults didn’t quite go unnoticed.

“What’s wrong?”

“Bart, promise me something?” Leonard said.

“What is it?”

“If any adult is hurting you or making you feel scared, you come to me. Got it?”

“Got it,” Bart agreed.

 

After that, Bart was a regular guest for breakfast. Leonard couldn’t blame him. Mick’s pancakes were totally worth a cross country trip. Eventually, the calls from worried relatives stopped, as it became clear that there was no stopping the young speedster. Bart rambled happily about stopping bad guys in Alabama, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he was talking to a group who could have been considered bad guys themselves. There was as strict “no talking about The Flash” rule instated though, after Leonard took advantage of Wally being stuck in space for a very successful crime spree.

The Flash vs Rogues battles were starting to feel more like family infighting than arch-nemeses. They’d all agreed to forget the incident where Heatwave had complimented The Flash’s grandmother’s recipes in the middle of a heist. (It had been a wonderful distraction.)

Even Lisa’s dates with Cisco were starting to feel like a routine. Leonard and Mick continued to ignore her loud complaints about never being able to bring anyone home. She’d replaced her couch with a very nice fold-out couch bed after their first heist back together, which really said everything.

It felt almost normal.

Daily breakfast became a weekly Sunday brunch as Bart’s civilian and superhero life finally started catching up to his near-endless energy. After a taste of Mick’s pancakes, Iris invited herself and Wally along. When Lisa started inviting Cisco, Leonard knew that relationship wasn’t ending anytime soon. It quickly became an unspoken rule in Central City that you didn’t cause trouble on Sunday mornings unless you wanted the combined fury of the Flash and Captain Cold on your head.

Bart occasionally brought friends. First Arrowette, then Preston, then a girl who introduced herself as Anita.

 

The doorbell rang.

Leonard and Lisa looked at each other. Lisa reached for her gun as Leonard went to answer it.

Bart was standing outside the apartment, the normally peppy speedster looking more solemn than Leonard had ever seen him.

“Can I come in?” Bart asked.

Leonard stepped aside to let him inside. Seeing him, Lisa put the gun away.

“What’s wrong, kiddo?” She motioned to the seat beside her on the couch, and Bart ran over and curled into her.

“You remember how you said to come to you if any adults hurt me?”

The Snart siblings tensed.

“Who’s hurting you?” Leonard asked gently, sitting down on his other side.

Bart shook his head. “It’s not me. I have this friend- There’s this boy at my school- His name’s Preston…”

“Is someone hurting him?” Lisa asked.

Bart nodded.

“Who?”

“I think… I think it’s his dad,” Bart told them. “The principal asked me to watch him and we were looking for monsters and then his dad came on a boat and Preston got really scared and he’s got so many bruises and Max says I can’t say anything until I’m sure and Preston won’t tell me anything and I don’t know what to do.”

Leonard and Lisa looked at each other. Finally, Lisa pulled down the collar of her shirt to expose a jagged scar.

“You asked me about this once, remember?”

“You said it was a long story,” Bart recalled.

“I lied,” Lisa told him. “It’s a very short story. My father threw a beer bottle at my head. He missed.”

Bart winced.

“Our dad was a police officer,” Leonard explained. “No one wanted to accuse him of beating his kids. The few times people tried, it got lost before they even opened an official case. So Max is right, sort of. You can’t just report hearsay. If Preston’s dad finds out people are suspicious of him but isn’t convicted of anything, he might hurt your friend worse.”

He rifled around in the side table he’d turned into a desk.

“Here.”

He handed Bart a seemingly ordinary pen. Lisa smiled, recognizing it for what it was.

“What’s this?” Bart asked.

“It’s a camera,” Leonard told him. “Click it twice to take a picture.”

“Like this?”

Bart attempted to snap a picture of Lisa. Leonard laughed.

“The camera lens is here, see? So you have to point it like this at whatever you want to see.”

Bart tried again, this time successfully snapping a picture of Leonard.

“There’s a mini USB port under the clip,” Leonard explained. “You can use that to get the pictures on a laptop or whatever. When you get the pictures you need, send them to the local police, but don’t count on them to act. Keep lots of copies backed up and threaten to contact a bunch of newspapers if they don’t do anything. That should work. You got all that?”

Bart nodded and tucked the pen in his pocket. “Got it.”

Lisa hugged him. “We’re so proud of you.”

 

Bart came back three days later, still looking shaken. This time, Mick was home too.

“Is this about your friend?” Leonard asked.

Mick looked up. He’d been filled in by the other two, but his eyes still widened seeing Bart looking so downtrodden.

The four of them piled onto the couch, Bart in the middle.

“It was his mom,” Bart explained finally.

Lisa winced. Leonard frowned. Both of them pulled Bart in closer. Mick’s hand on Leonard’s back felt like the only steady thing in the world.

“You caught her though?” Leonard asked.

Bart nodded. “I got pictures like you said. They arrested her.” He paused. “They’re taking her to a mental hospital. Preston says he’s gonna go visit her. Why would he do that?”

“It’s hard to stop loving your parents,” Lisa explained. “I guess it was easier for us, because we had each other. I could never hate Lewis for my own sake, but when he hurt Lenny? That I could hate him for.”

Leonard reached over and squeezed her shoulder.

“It’s not fair,” Bart said.

“Life ain’t fair, kid,” Mick replied. “You keep going with what you’ve got and you try your best and that’s all you can do.”

 “Were your parents mean too?” Bart asked.

“Nah,” Mick told him. “Mine were just fine.”

Leonard pulled him in closer, remembering what _had_ happened to Mick’s parents.

Bart reached for Leonard and Lisa’s free hands and held them tight.

They stayed there for a long time.

 

“Her name’s Arrowette!” Bart announced cheerfully the day he showed up at their door with a blonde girl with a red mask in tow. She looked about fifteen.

Arrowette waved nervously. “Hi. It’s nice to meet you.”

Lisa was the first to recover.

“Hello, Arrowette. Come on in.”

Arrowette looked around.

“I’ve never been to a supervillain’s lair before,” she whispered to Bart.

“This is Lisa’s apartment,” Leonard clarified. “The lair is on the other side of town.”

“I think it’s officially just our apartment,” Mick chimed in. “We’ve been living here for almost a year.”

“So what brings you two here?” Lisa asked.

“Uncle Max won’t let me bring anyone in costume back to Manchester and Cissie’s mom is weird about her hanging out with boys, so I thought we could come hang out here.”

“Bart!” Cissie hissed. “No names!”

“Oops.”

“I’ve become unfortunately used to not revealing superhero identities,” Leonard told her. “You can trust us.”

“Fine,” Cissie agreed. “But no last names.”

Bart grinned and threw himself on the couch.

“Wanna watch something? They’ve got Netflix!”

Leonard wondered when his home had turned into an afterschool program for teen superheroes.

 

Bart had been looking nervous all afternoon. By now, the excuse that he was there to play videogames was wearing thin.

Leonard finally paused the game. It took Bart a few seconds to notice.

“Spit it out,” he demanded.

“If I were hypothetically trying to break into a building would you help me plan it?” Bart asked.

Leonard grinned. “Thinking of joining the Dark Side?”

Bart shook his head. “It’s more of a… prison break?”

“I’ve done plenty of those. Can you get me blueprints and some information on the security system?”

Bart disappeared, reappearing a few minutes later with a bunch of blueprints and a sealed container of gas.

Leonard began spreading the blueprints out on the table.

“What’s that?” he asked. “A smoke bomb?”

“Oh, right! That’s just the best way to carry her when I’m running long distances!”

He unscrewed the top and a figure made of smoke emerged. After a moment, it resolved into the shape of a girl.

“Uh, hi?”

Bart grinned. “Uncle Lenny, this is my friend, Secret. She knows the security. Secret, this is my Uncle Lenny. He’s Captain Cold.”

“Should that mean something to me?” Secret asked.

“It means he robs banks for a living,” Bart explained. “If anyone can help us rescue your friends, it’s him. And he won’t tell anyone, right?”

“Your secret is safe with me,” Leonard promised.

The pun had really been too good to pass up.

 

“Hey, Lenny? What would you say if I told you I was pregnant?” Lisa remarked casually.

Leonard didn’t look up from the game of checkers he was playing against himself.

“I’d remind you that you’ve identified as, and I quote ‘super hella ace’ since high school and you used the payout from your first heist to get on birth control. Which you’re still on unless something changed since this morning.”

“You’re no fun.” Lisa pouted. “Anyway, you used the payout from your first solo heist to pay for top surgery, so I was just following your example. Medical necessities first.”

“So, what are you trying to soften me up for?” Leonard asked.

He knew how his sister worked. She’d say something bad, tell him she’s just joking, then drop the real bombshell.

“I’m moving in with Cisco,” she said.

That got him to look up.

“It’s that serious?” he asked.

She shrugged. “I guess so. I mean, he asked me, and I spend more time there than I do here anyway and you and Mick have been paying the rent for months so I guess it just seemed right.”

“Not what I asked,” Leonard pointed out. “Do you want to move in with him?”

Lisa looked away and smiled a bit.

“Yeah, I think I do.”

“Then do it. But remember, you can always come home.”

Lisa hugged him.

“I know. Thanks, Lenny.”

 

Leonard wasn’t sure he approved of cross-dimensional teen superhero team-ups, but it had been Wally’s idea. And Bart seemed happy enough with his new team. Watching the news broadcasts – Iris taped all of them – the kids seemed pretty competent. Or at least their leader, who went by the name of Robin, seemed competent. Leonard might have tried recruiting him for the Rogues team he was building if he hadn’t been a teenage superhero from another dimension.

But when Bart brought six teen superheroes over for a sleepover, Leonard had to draw a line.

“No.”

“Awwww, Uncle Lenny….”

“I have _plans_ tomorrow,” he explained. “Go bother someone else. Your grandmother would be thrilled, I’m sure.”

“Grandma hosted the last three,” Bart explained. “She won’t do it again. I’ve asked _everyone._ ”

Leonard sighed.

“Mick?”

“Let the kids in,” Mick suggested from the couch.

“Fine,” Leonard agreed. “One night. But you need to find your own headquarters after this.”

When the kids showed up to stop his carefully planned and speedster-proofed heist the next morning, Leonard cursed the universe’s sick sense of humor. What kind of teenagers were up before noon?

 

Leonard didn’t visit Iris West often, but she’d promised to give Mick her Grandma Esther’s recipe for chocolate cake if the Rogues would help her with spring cleaning. He suspected it was actually a ploy to keep them all busy for a few days while Wally was away on whatever space mission he was dealing with, but he wasn’t complaining. They could use the break, and the sight of Axel Walker scrubbing countertops while muttering under his breath really made the whole experience worth it.

The fact that Bart didn’t knock on the door was the first sign something was wrong. He just appeared in the middle of Iris’ living room, shaking. Leonard almost reached for his cold gun, before realizing that this wasn’t Bart losing control of his speed.

He was having a panic attack.

“Mick, keep everyone out of the living room,” he ordered softly. “Except Iris. Find her and send her in.”

He approached the young speedster slowly

“Hey, Bart, can you look at me?”

He knelt down, and Bart practically collapsed in his arms, the shaking quickly turning to sobbing.

“Len? What happened?”

He heard Iris behind him, but he didn’t look up, even as he felt her kneel down on Bart’s other side and begin rubbing Bart’s back.

“Bart? It’s Grandma. You’re okay. Can you tell us what happened?”

“Nonononono” Bart was shivering and clinging to Leonard like a lifeline.

Leonard hugged him closer.

“We’re here,” he promised. “We’re not going anywhere.”

“I died!” Bart finally burst out between sobs.

Leonard and Iris shared a look over his head.

“Alternate universe?” Leonard mouthed.

Iris shrugged.

“I saw myself die once,” she told Bart. “It’s scary. But you’re still alive. And you’re going to be okay.”

Familiar footsteps approached them.

“Mick,” Leonard growled a warning.

He needed someone he could trust to keep the rest of the rogues from gawking. They might all be fond of the youngest speedster, but they weren’t family yet.

“I called Wally,” Mick explained softly. “He told me what happened. They were in the middle of a war zone. Bart made a time remnant to go scouting. They watched it die.”

“’s not an it,” Bart mumbled. “It was me.”

“Was Wally there?” Iris asked.

“I don’t think so,” Mick replied. “He said he heard what happened from Robin.”

“Who leaves a group of kids alone in a war zone?” Iris wondered.

“Not his fault,” Bart insisted.

“He took you there,” Leonard insisted.

“It wasn’t supposed to be like that.”

Leonard could imagine all too well what had gone down. They’d given the kids an easy job. Something that was supposed to be safe. They’d started trusting them too much. And then things went wrong. No matter how competent they were, they were just kids. They should have been sent home as soon as someone realized how bad things were. But no one had realized, and now Bart was hurt in a way that might never heal.

“I don’t want to be a superhero anymore,” Bart admitted in a tiny voice.

“You don’t have to be,” Iris promised.

“No one is going to make you,” Leonard agreed. “You don’t owe them anything.”

“Hey, Bart,” Mick called. “There are a bunch of kids at the door to see you. Should I send them packing?”

Bart was silent.

“Baby?” Iris prompted.

“I wanna see them,” Bart whispered.

“Send them in!” Leonard shouted.

Within moments, there were teenagers surrounding him.

“He just ran off as soon as we were back on Earth,” Empress said.

“We were so worried,” Wonder Girl added.

“Hey, Bart?”

Robin seemed like the only one who’d dealt with panic attacks before, so Leonard gave Bart a gentle push towards the masked boy. Bart ended up curled between Robin and Arrowette, with the rest of the team surrounding them.

Leonard and Iris retreated to the couch, letting the teenagers take care of each other. They all looked like they’d been through a lot, and he thought they needed this just as much as Bart did.

“They’ll be older after this,” Leonard observed.

“I wish they didn’t have to be,” Iris murmured.

“They’ll be okay though.”

“You think?”

“They have each other, and they have us. They’ll be okay.”

He tried to sound more confident than he felt.

 

Sunday brunch was always a crowded occasion nowadays. They’d had to move the location to an unused warehouse by the docks once the Rogues became regular guests, along with Bart’s teammates and Lisa and Cisco’s two adopted kids. Occasionally, Wally brought along one of his superhero friends. As of late, Supergirl had a suspicious habit of showing up needing help with a minor problem just in time to join.

Mick had threatened to stop making food if someone didn’t help him, and now the act of making breakfast was as much a part of the tradition as eating it. Lisa’s kids helped Mick with the pancakes, the Rogues made eggs and sausage, Iris and Caitlyn made fresh orange juice, and the Young Justice team set the table.

Leonard took a moment to look around. There was hugging and bickering and his Rogues showing off unnecessarily. Lisa was scolding her son Taylor for trying to juggle eggs. Bart and Superboy and Empress and Blue Beetle were making faces at each other. Hartley was… probably gossiping… with Robin in ASL.

It felt like family. Not the type of family Leonard was familiar with, but the families in the movies he’d always thought couldn’t possibly exist.

It felt like home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick rundown on where I pulled stories from comics canon:  
> \- The sequence with Preston is based on issue #6 of Impulse.  
> \- The scene with Secret is set directly leading up to Young Justice Secret Files #1. I couldn't resist the idea of Len helping the kids break a group of young metahumans out of a government facility.  
> \- Bart's panic attack is based on a DC crossover event titled "Our Worlds at War". Bart witnessing his own death happens specifically in Impulse #77. It's actually the death of what he refers to as a "speed scout", but since that's nearly identical to the tv show's "time remnant" I went with the tv language.
> 
> Also for the purposes of this fic, Young Justice is a mix of teens from Earth-1 and Earth-38 (Supergirl's Earth). My lineup (all of these people were never on the team at the same time but who cares) is as follows:  
> Earth 1 – Bart Allen (Impulse), Anita Fite (Empress), Cissie King-Jones (Arrowette), Greta Hayes (Secret)  
> Earth 38 – Kon-El (Superboy), Tim Drake (Robin), Cassie Sandsmark (Wonder Girl), Jaime Reyes (Blue Beetle)


End file.
